Vietnamís
authorities have announced that prominent human right attorney Nguyen Van Dai is
charged with subversion under Article 79 of the countryís 1999 Penal Code and
the previous charge of ďconducting anti-state propagandaĒ under Article 88 will
remain.

The lawyer, who
was arrested in late 2015, will be held further for investigation and the
pre-trial detention may be extended to 20 months. If convicted, he will face
hard sentence as the punishment for the subversion allegation is life
imprisonment or capital punishment while for the second allegation the
imprisonment may be up to 20 years.

His assistant Le
Thi Thu Ha is also probed for the two charges.

Vietnam has also
extended the investigation period for second time against human rights defender
Luu Van Vinh, who was arrested on November 6, 2017 and charged with subversion.
Mr. Vinh will be kept incommunicado at least until late October, and he has not
been permitted to meet with his lawyer nor relatives, the practice Vietnam has
applied in political cases.

On August 20,
the Peopleís
Court of Hoang Mai town in Vietnamís central province of Nghe An announced
that it delayed the trial against
former prisoner of conscience Nguyen Van Oai scheduled on August 21.
The reason is the absence of one of witnesses, it said.

Amnesty
International launched a campaign calling international community to take an
urgent action on the case of human rights defender Nguyen Bac Truyen, who was
kidnapped by Vietnamís security forces on July 30 and later charged with
subversion. Specifically, the London-based human rights organization urged
people worldwide to write petitions to Vietnamís prime minister, minister of
public security and foreign minister to demand to release the former prisoner of
conscience immediately and unconditionally.